VANCOUVER, B.C. — The Portland Winterhawks needed less than a minute — 56 seconds to be precise — to lock up a 6-1 win against Vancouver, sweeping the Giants out of the playoffs in four games.

Brendan Leipsic, Adam De Champlain and Alex Schoenborn each scored in a span from 16 minutes, 9 seconds to 17:05 in the first period, shushing the crowd of 5,142 fans at Pacific Coliseum.

Portland wins the best-of-seven series 4-0, extends its most recent win streak to 11 games and the biggest payoff from the sweep is the time off. Portland is the only team in the Western
Conference to move on thus far, and will wait to see who their opponent
will be in the next round.

Rest “is really important,” Mike Johnston, Portland’s coach and general manager said. “The volume of games you could play before the Memorial Cup if you went all the way, you could play 28 games. You want to keep that as low as possible if you’re going to have a chance at being successful.”

Carter Popoff scored a power-play goal for Vancouver to cut the lead to 3-1 at 9:47 in the second period, before Oliver Bjorkstrand scored a power-play goal for the Hawks at 13:35. Keegan Iverson boosted Portland’s lead to 5-1 when he scored an even-strength goal, unassisted, at 2:50 in the third. Chase De Leo scored the team’s final goal at 12:51, but the game was over long before that.

Six Portland goals. Six different goal scorers.

“It’s good. You want depth through your lineup in playoffs,” Leipsic said. “You’re going to need it. Some guys will be on some nights, and some will be going on others. It was nice to see different guys contributing tonight.”

Offensively, Leipsic has been the spark in the first round. He scored five goals and had four assists for nine points in those four games. He has been pesky, punishing and provocative. Even with lopsided leads from the second period on in Game 4, he hustled, playing one high-energy shift after another.

“Leipsic’s been our MVP for this series,” Johnston said.

The head-shaking moment came in Game 2 at the Moda Center, when he skated out of a scrum to the back of the Vancouver net, casually reached for goaltender Payton Lee’s water bottle and took a quenching drink.

Lee said later he’d never seen anything like that and in Vancouver, coach Don Hay called the move “classless.” Portland team captain Taylor Leier was laughing when he called Leipsic “an idiot.”

The move earned Leipsic a penalty, squandered Portland’s 5-on-3 opportunity, and he apologized. But it wasn’t a distraction in the series and in the end, just didn’t matter. Portland has been on a roll that’s impressive in any sport at any level.

The Hawks lost a game at Victoria on Jan. 10. Since then, they’ve won 32 of their last 33 games, a run that includes a franchise-best streak of 21 wins in a row.

Portland goaltender Brendan Burke played every minute of the first playoff series, and aside from a flukey goal that rebounded from the end boards and tucked in under his leg as he rolled back into the crease for a Giants goal, he was steady when challenged and gymnastic when he faced flurries of shots.

“I really liked Burke’s play as well, tonight,” Johnston said. “He was tested again several times early in the game and really held his own.”

Note: With an assist in Wednesday’s game Derrick Pouliot moves into a first-place tie with former Hawk Glen Wesley for the franchise record in career playoff points for defensemen, with 47. Wesley now is the director of defensemen with the Carolina Hurricanes.